If I Had My Life to Live Over, I'd Live Over a Formula 1 Garage

Electricity and turbos take on new roles in 2014 F1. Also 54.5 mpg in 2025? Really??

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We ran this title many years ago, and in the spirit of recycling.... There has been no lack of brouhaha about coming F1 regulations—turbo inline-4s in 2013? Er...no; it's turbo V-6s in 2014. KERS doubling their output from 60 to 120 kW; turbo compounding on its way?

Attempting to keep up with this (I find the Brit Racecar Engineering and Race Tech both excellent specialist magazines), I've gleaned neat nuggets.

Put into perspective
Consider that a current F1 2.4-liter V-8 revs to 18,000 rpm and produces around 735 bhp, with its KERS occasionally adding another 80 hp. The car with driver weighs a minimum 640 kg or 1411 lb. A 2011 Indy car/driver combination weighed 1565 lb. on ovals and 1630 lb. on road courses. Figure on its 3.5-liter V-8 making maybe 650 bhp. To complete matters, a NASCAR Sprint Cup car weighs 3400 lb. Its 358-cu.-in. pushrod V-8 produces around 865 bhp—and revs amazingly to around 9K! All are normally aspirated.

That old devil CO2
In a typical 200-mile race, an F1 car is reported to burn approximately 160 kg of fuel, that is, about 350 lb., or around 56 gal., thus getting about 3.6 mpg. Another source cites this is about 1200 grams/kilometer of CO2, all the more conflicting when viewed from the perspective of the FIA's avowed eco-friendly aspirations and the European Union 2015 automaker fleet average limit of 130 g/km CO2.

Recall as well that CO2 output is directly related to carbonaceous fuel consumed—there's no such thing as a CO2 catalytic converter. Also, another factoid in this regard: Our 2016 Corporate Average Fuel Economy 35.5 mpg is equivalent to 250 g/mile CO2, 155 g/km of the stuff.

It's figured that 2014 regulations will mitigate the FIA/EU conundrum by reducing F1 fuel consumption by 30–35 percent. Two regulatory approaches have been mentioned: a limited quantity for the race, plus—bringing back an idea of Keith Duckworth (he, the "worth" of Cosworth)—a limit on the engine's fuel flow.

This latter is also a control of power, one that's seen as easier to administer than limiting boost of 2014's single turbo. And, as Rob White of Renault Sport F1 noted, "It's a little perverse in a fuel consumption formula to limit the amount of air one is allowed to consume." It makes a lot more sense to limit the fuel itself.

Class 8 truck tech to F1
Really big trucks, the Class 8 variety, have the most efficient of internal combustion engines, and it's not only their turbodiesel configuration. Many of these trucks have turbo compounding, something that's being noodled for F1 come 2014.

As the term suggests, turbo compounding makes multiple uses of exhaust gas energy. With a Cummins/Scandia setup, for example, there's a separate power turbine downstream of the engine's conventional turbocharger. Work generated by the power turbine is fed back to the engine via a geartrain and fluid coupling.

Or it could operate an electric generator, the resulting juice running a semi trailer's refrigeration unit—or supplementing an F1 car's Kinetic Energy Recovery System. Caterpillar has a variation of this, sans separate turbine, wherein the turbocharger's excess power spins the generator.

In fact, those in F1 are no longer thinking of KERS, but of a more general ERS, as in Energy Recovery Systems, exploiting not only the kinetic energy of braking but also the engine's exhaust energy.

Regulations for 2014 double KERS power from 60 to 120 kW (160 hp). Even more important, 4 MJ of energy can be restored per lap (10 times the current 400 kJ). Also, and tantalizing, there's no regulation concerning turbo compounding's potential contribution, figured to be as much as another 55 hp.

54.5 or fight?
The 54.5-mpg Corporate Average Fuel Economy proposal for 2025 jogged my mind to the phrase "Fifty-four Forty or Fight!" Do you suppose American History classes still teach this one? The slogan was used by James K. Polk in the 1844 presidential election, in earnest claim that the U.S./Canadian "Oregon Country" border should be set at North Latitude 54° 40´. Polk won the election, though the 1846 Treaty of Oregon peaceably extended the considerably southerly 49° border that existed east of the Continental Divide. (Otherwise, for goodness sake, the Vancouver Canucks would be an American hockey team.)

CAFE versus the real world
That 54.5 mpg is one of two government proposals for 2025 Corporate Average Fuel Economy; this one, from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Our National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has suggested 49.6 mpg as a 2025 CAFE target.

Don't get your (albeit long-range) hopes up, though. The hypothetically average vehicle in 2025 isn't likely to achieve this sort of fuel economy, any more than a typical 2016 model will deliver CAFE's much heralded 35.5 mpg.

To see why, you have to consider how mpg numbers are derived and then employed in CAFE as well as in the EPA Fuel Economy Guide and on new car Monroney labels. For full details, see "Monroney Reading Self-Taught," April 2011; and "Keeping Kewl," June 2011. For a timely summary, check out "Don't Expect Your Car to Get CAFE-Mandated Mpg" in the Road & Track 2012 Car Buyer's Guide, on sale mid-November 2011. And for the punch line in all this, read on here.

Numbers galore—many with fudge
Over the years, EPA City and Highway numbers have undergone additional conditioning—call it fudging if you like—all the better to reflect real-world driving. And, in fact, if you compare EPA numbers with our own albeit less repeatable values, you'll find we're typically 1–3 mpg above EPA City. That is, I continue to believe that today's EPA Fuel Economy Guide and Monroney labels do an excellent job of estimating real-world driving.

However—note well—the values used in CAFE calculations are the raw unconditioned data. It's figured that EPA's real-world correction factors bring these down by 20–25 percent.

Hence, for instance, that typically average CAFE contributor of 35.5 mpg in 2016 would deliver around 27.5 mpg in the real world. (The arithmetic is left to the reader.) And EPA has estimated that its 54.5 mpg proposed for 2025 CAFE would equate to around 39 mpg as a real fleet average (part of this attributed to CAFE crediting advanced air conditioning and the like).

In any case, there's no reason for 54.5 or fight. Just read your (and our) Guide.